


were there clues i didn’t see? (invisible string)

by theglitterati



Series: Folklore x Haikyuu!! [8]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Based on a Taylor Swift Song, Childhood Memories, M/M, Red String of Fate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:42:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25600789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theglitterati/pseuds/theglitterati
Summary: Akaashi doesn’t know it, but this is not the first time he’s met Bokuto Koutarou.
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou
Series: Folklore x Haikyuu!! [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1850215
Comments: 4
Kudos: 62





	were there clues i didn’t see? (invisible string)

Akaashi doesn’t know it yet, but the ace who keeps mispronouncing his name is his future husband. If he did know, he might question his future self’s judgement.

He also doesn’t know that this is not the first time he’s met Bokuto Koutarou.

*

When Keiji was five, his mother took him to a nearby playground on weekends. It was a tiny park surrounded by fences, a giant ladybug slide in the middle. Keiji was a quiet kid, unwilling or unable — his mother wasn’t sure yet — to speak with anyone but his parents. She brought him to the playground hoping he’d make friends, since he hadn’t made any at school.

Keiji didn’t understand why people always wanted him to talk. He was content to sit in the corner of the park, examining bugs on the ground. The other kids were mean, and rough. They stepped on his bugs. Keiji didn’t like people who were mean.

One day, a boy Keiji had never seen before came to the park. He was bigger than everyone else, but he must have been their age, because older kids thought it was uncool to play at the park. The other kids were mean to the big kid. He was loud, and too fast to catch when they played tag. They told him he couldn’t play with them anymore.

Even at five, Keiji was sensitive to injustice. The big kid just wanted to keep playing, the same way Keiji wanted to be left alone. Despite their differences, they had this in common: other people wanted to tell them how to behave.

Keiji left his corner and walked up to the ringleader of the kids. Without saying a word, he pulled his foot back and kicked him in the shin, hard enough to make him fall over. He nodded once to the big kid, whose mouth hung open, and walked away.

*

When Keiji was eight, his mother took him to see a doctor. The doctor was going to find out why he didn’t talk.

Keiji thought the trip was unnecessary. There was nothing wrong with him — he  _ could  _ talk, he just didn’t want to. He didn’t see the point of speaking up in class, or making friends, or telling people to stop when they bullied him. Maybe if he explained this to his mother, she would understand, but he didn’t see the point that, either.

The doctor’s office had a play area, a rug with a few toys and some books piled on a shelf. “Stay here while I fill out the forms,” Keiji’s mother told him.

Keiji took his usual spot in the corner and looked around at the other kids. Here, most of them were quiet like him, but there was one, tall and skinny, with funny hair, who wasn’t like him at all.

Keiji was surprised when the boy crouched down in front of him. “Hi! Do you wanna play with me?” he asked.

Keiji frowned.

“You don’t have to.” Keiji expected him to leave, but he sat down on the rug. “Is it your first time here?”

Keiji nodded.

“Are you scared?” 

Keiji shook his head. 

“I think you’re lying,” the boy said, “because you look scared! But it’s okay, Tareda-sensei is really nice! You don’t have to be afraid!”

“Koutarou.” The boy’s mother hovered over him. “Don’t talk so loudly.”

“But he’s scared!”

“Stop bothering him and come with me.”

The boy, Koutarou, was dragged away. “Bye!” he said brightly, still smiling despite getting in trouble.

He hadn’t been bothering Keiji at all. But Keiji didn’t see the point in saying that.

*

They found each other, again and again. Their grandfathers died two days apart, and they just missed each other shopping for suits. The same kid, in Akaashi’s class and Bokuto’s karate club, gave both of them chicken pox, patient zero for their fated meeting.

But Akaashi didn’t remember any of this when he watched Bokuto play and decided to come to Fukurodani, and he doesn’t remember it now as he regrets that decision, Bokuto continuing to call him  _ Akashi  _ and yell like he’s not a foot away.

“It’s Akaashi,” he says quietly and for the third time.

“Sorry!” Bokuto doesn’t sound sorry at all. “Wanna toss for me?”

Akaashi frowns. “Aren’t you tired?” They just finished a two-hour practice.

“Nah! Sometimes you just wanna keep playing, you know?”

“No,” Akaashi says, but Bokuto’s smile is so big that he can’t help smiling, too. “But I’ll toss for you, anyway.”

*

Years later, Akaashi and Bokuto take their daughter for a visit with her grandparents. It’s a nice day, so the three of them go for a walk, pushing the babbling girl in a stroller.

They pass a park with a giant ladybug in the centre and the girl yells that she wants to go in. Her dads acquiesce, pushing her around the perimeter of the park.

“Did you ever come here as a kid?” Akaashi asks. It’s not the closest park to Bokuto’s parent’s house, but it’s not far, either.

“I think maybe a couple times?”

“I used to come here a lot,” Akaashi tells him. His words flow freely now, especially with his husband. “Actually, the only time I ever got in big trouble as a kid was here. There was this other kid who was getting bullied, and for some reason, I kicked the kid that was doing it right in the—”

Akaashi’s interrupted by Bokuto lifting him off the ground and spinning him around and around. Leaning over in her stroller, their daughter watches the bugs on the ground.


End file.
